Attention Attorney General Alberto Gonzales: you better hope that George Bush has your back:
Within hours after Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s announced retirement from the Supreme Court, members of conservative groups around the country convened in five national conference calls in which, participants said, they shared one big concern: heading off any effort by President Bush to nominate his attorney general, Alberto R. Gonzales, to replace her.
The reason: he is not pure enough. And if you don’t believe that then read more of this New York Times piece:
Late last week, a delegation of conservative lawyers led by C. Boyden Gray and former Attorney General Edwin Meese III met with the White House chief of staff, Andrew H. Card Jr., to warn that appointing Mr. Gonzales would splinter conservative support.
Meese was AG under President Ronald Reagan and remains a respected conservative leader and lawyer. (“Meese,” by the way, is the plural of “mouse..”)
And Paul M. Weyrich, a veteran conservative organizer and chairman of the Free Congress Foundation, said he had told administration officials that nominating Mr. Gonzales, whose views on abortion are considered suspect by religious conservatives, would fracture the president’s conservative backers.
The groundswell of opposition to Mr. Gonzales was just one sign of the conflicting forces suddenly swirling around Mr. Bush this weekend as he headed to Camp David to begin considering a replacement for Justice O’Connor, a decision his aides said would not be announced before he returned from a trip to Europe at the end of next week.
Senate Democrats demanded that he consult them before making a choice and appoint a pragmatist in Justice O’Connor’s mold.
Of course, there are several components at work here:
- Pressure on GWB to appoint a conservative who can be relied to remain one on the bench and not turn out to be a “stealth liberal.”
- The Democrats demanding that Bush respect the Senate’s role and talk to them before making a choice. Bush could call Democrats into his office and talk to them, talk to them on the phone — then make whatever decision he wants. In other words, he COULD defuse some tensions, if he wanted to. But if he doesn’t show the institutional respect and just appoints who he wants — and someone who polarizes the country — it will be a intentional choice to accentuate national political tensions.
- The Democrats demanding a pragmatist like O’Connor. But O’Connor evolved into being the “swing vote.” She wasn’t chosen to be one.
And then there’s this:
Conservatives, flexing their muscles in a battle they have spent a decade preparing for, described the nomination as a test of Mr. Bush’s convictions and past promises, and his biggest opportunity yet to assure that the Bush presidency will leave a conservative stamp for a generation to come.
And on Friday, the Rev. Miguel Rivera, president of the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders, a group that represents more than 6,000 Latino evangelical churches, sent the president a letter urging consideration of “a true conservative Latino nominee,” Emilio M. Garza, a federal appeals judge from Texas.
In a telephone interview late Friday, Mr. Rivera said he had received no response. “All the meetings we have had in all the different groups today we have not heard anything to reassure us that he is out of the loop,” Mr. Rivera said of Mr. Gonzales.
The Times goes onto say that White House officials are dismissing the conservative response, that GWB knows it’s out there, etc.
In a way, this is George Bush’s supreme defining moment — as a matter of personal principle.
He can’t run again. This is one of his last shots. If he feels Gonzales is a good man and is someone who HE would want to put on the court will Bush have the courage to nominate him or will he act in a way that he prides himself as not acting on in other matters — by holding his finger up to the wind and going in the direction the wind goes?
Is it wiser for him to construct his own legacy or to be attuned to what the base wants it to be, and let them construct it for him?
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.